Archive for July, 2011

One of the many problems you have when you run a small company is you get stretched in every direction possible.  I probably don’t need to tell you how many business hats you have to wear in a day; marketing, selling, finance, support, trouble shooting and even Human Resources.   Oh, and once you have finished all of these, then there is the actual work – you know, the stuff that generates revenue.

If you try and do it all, you could go mad.  Yes, you could try working 24 hours a day and work all the weekends available to you, but there is more to life than money.   Health, happiness and Mental Stability are all important.  If you try to do too much, it will pull you down and you will end up achieving nothing.

One option which is worth considering is the use of a Virtual Assistant: A person to help you out on all the ‘small stuff’.   Used in the right way, they can make you more productive, and actually save you money.

Virtual Assistants- Overcoming the Cost Restriction
When I first thought about using a virtual assistant, I have to admit I was worried about the cost.   Why on earth would I pay somebody to do something when I could do it myself and pocket the money?  Then I sat down and looked at the maths.   Lets say I charge £500 a day (a figure I picked from the air).  If I work an 8 hour day, that means I earn £62.50p an hour.   So if I pay somebody £20 an hour to do something and I can fill the extra hour with my normal work, I actually make £42 more than I would doing the ‘small stuff’ myself.

So not getting help is actually costing me money.  Doh!!

Work that Virtual Assistants can do
Virtual Assistants are just that – virtual.  They don’t sit near you, you can’t pass them a bit of paper, and you can’t say ‘look at this – watch how I do this, now you do the same’.  But you can email them tasks, post them packs and of course call them.   They may be local, or they may work on the other side of the world.  As long as they can do a decent job, make the minimum of mistakes, and can speak the same language as you – there is lots they can be getting on with.

Depending on the type of business you run, tasks they can perform could include:

• Chase invoice payments
• Call or email back on sales enquiries
• Scan documents and file them on your computer/file store
• SEO your web site
• Perform web site submission
• Proof reading of your documents
• Research into competitors
• Research into customers
• Web/Printed content layout and graphical design
• Stuff envelopes for mail shots
• Transcribe voice dictation notes (very useful if you drive a lot)
• Research and book hotels, flights and restaurants
• Send follow up/thank you/initial contact/meeting request emails on your behalf
• Review CVs
• Assist in processes (including creating ISO processes)
• Software coding and Testing

Yes, the last one on the list is correct; they can do heavily technical jobs too.   When you employ a Virtual Assistant, you have the option of employing a ‘virtual person’ from a team with different skills.   You pay by the hour, and the person with the best skills for the task is allocated.  You still have a principle contact, but they may get their co-worker to do the task as their friend has stronger skills for the task.

Costs and Location
Now, it’s a fairly safe bet that you live somewhere in Europe or the USA where costs can be high (and are rising).  But there are plenty of highly skilled educated people all over the world you can use.   Depending on how you view cost saving vs. exploitation and the skill set your require, the rates can be low – very low.  Typical cost varies between £5 (overseas) or £15 and £25 an hour for UK/USA.    Whilst you may think that working with somebody in Asia may have its disadvantages, it also has the advantage that you can assign work, go to sleep, and wake with the report/task/project in your in tray.

Resources
There are lots of companies that list, support and manage Virtual Assistants for you.   The advantage of going through a managing agent is that it takes the headache out of finding somebody, managing them and you can end the relationship when ever you want.

Whilst it’s hard to recommend any particular company or service as it will vary depending on the location you want to pick a VA from and the skill set required, it is well worth looking at the following sites: Odesk, RemoteWorkMate and TalantGurus.

Imagine you were stopped in the street and were offered a Rolex.   It’s in a nice box, the box says Rolex, and the watch says Rolex.  It’s all sparkly, gold plated, and looks very nice.  There in the box is the printed Rolex guarantee. Everything looks good.

Now imagine the person offers you the Rolex for £50 – what is your first thought?!?   Would you think it’s a real Rolex?  Is it genuine?  Or is it a knock off from China that will fall apart after 2 days?

Of course, this situation happens in business when we offer our products and services – people judge us not only on what we say, what we say our products and services do, but also on the price.   Pricing too high makes it look like a rip-off, but pricing it too cheaply makes it look like an inferior product.

I don’t do web site design, but if I offered to create a full web site with as many pages as you need for £99, what do you think the quality of that web site would be?  Something you would be happy with?  I doubt it.

Feeling Guilty

It’s often said that as a freelancer or small business owner, if you send out a quotation or estimate and you don’t feel guilty about the price being asked, you are not charging enough.  It’s also said that trying to win business by being the cheapest is a fool’s game – there will always be somebody cheaper.   I always try and pitch my work on just about the other side of the guilty feeling (I always have a moment of doubt if I am charging too much).  But how can you tell if the price is right?

Pitching a Prestige Price

To test my pricing, now and again I pitch work at what I consider to be a prestige price.   A price which is way beyond my comfort zone – just to see what the reaction is.  Not because I am trying to rip anybody off (the service is still worth the money), but to see if I should be upping my game in terms of quality and service, and so charge more for the service delivered.

Now I only do this when I reach a certain point; when I have more business than I can handle.   Normally, I would not actually bid for work when I am too busy as I would be over stretched and so fail to deliver anything on time or with the expected quality.   But now and again, instead of just not bidding, I will bid with a much higher delivery spec and a much higher price.   Imagine my quote turning from a standard Ford or Toyota into a RollsRoyce of quotes.

With my business growing and busy, it doesn’t actually hurt me for them to go with somebody else.  But in the odd times when I win one of the prestige bids, it allows me to negotiate later delivery, hire staff to help, but also to review my prices longer term.  The extra stress of multiple projects and the sudden required business growth is offset by the larger than normal fee.

I don’t bid prestige with a figure which would hurt my business (through seeming to rip off the customer), but I do bid high because the situation allows, and to see what happens.  Typically, I will bid between 100% and 200% more than I normally would – depending on the size of the project and my perception of the customer.

But even if you don’t have prestige prices and you are trying to win work through normal pricing, make sure the prices is what other people consider normal.   Don’t be the guy (or girl) trying to sell the Rolex for £50.  People will see straight through you.

As part of my Google Optimisation experiments, I made a few changes to a number of my web site pages.  Now, I don’t get a lot of traffic, so it takes a while to see if anything makes a major difference.  But, I have seen one metric drastically improve overnight.

It’s on my contacts page.

I actually thought my contacts page was pretty good.  I had all the boxes ticked including:

• My company details listed – with my business address, and location
• Not making the contacts page ask for mandatory sensitive information (i.e, phone number is not mandatory)
• A clickable email address – in case people wanted to just, you know. . . email me
• A simple web enquiry form in case they preferred web form communication
• The company number with the internal dialling number in case phone was their preferred method of communication.

Despite all of this, the bounce rate was still at around 70%.  70% of people who made it to my contacts page never made contact.    I could not understand why.   I tried various versions of the web page – sometimes with the web form on the left, sometimes on the right, sometimes with the phone number in bold – I was only seeing differences of around 3 or 4%.

Then I added something – just a bit of text – to my contacts page.  Immediately, my bounce rate reduced to 20%, and the number of enquiries jumped.

When I think about it, it was silly not to have this text on my contacts page in the first place.  After all, people visiting my site don’t know anything about me, just as your visitors do not know anything about you.  I am asking them to provide their details to me, and they have no idea what I am going to do with them.

Which is why I think the following statement on my contacts page (in plain sight, directly below the contact form) has really helped get more people contacting me for business meetings:

We hate spam as much as you do!

We promise that we will never sell, share or trade your details. Ever!  We won’t even add them to any mailing list that we run.  We will contact you about your enquiry, and that’s it!

Now it could be said I should be adding them to a mail list and emailing them, but I have never had the time or motivation to create regular newsletters – I prefer the personal touch.   And so far, its working!

I have spent this weekend in Paris to celebrate my wife’s 40^th Birthday.   As part of this trip, we visited a fabulous restaurant called Le Fermette Marbeuf.  The restaurant is very pricey, but the food is very good and the decoration is exquisite.  But in spite of spending an awful lot of money with them, the service was nothing short of shocking.

We both ordered starters, main courses and deserts.   My wife received her starter and I got. . .  an empty plate.  Yes, they actually brought me a plate with nothing on.    We explained that I had ordered a starter, but they didn’t seem at all fussed – they disappeared to check on the starter.   About 30 minutes later, two more plates arrived – with our main courses.   When I explained I was missing a starter, the waiter just shrugged, and wandered away.

So OK, they had made a mistake – they had goofed.  They were very busy, and maybe they didn’t have enough staff.  They had somehow lost an order for a starter (or turned my order into an order for “Starter La Empty-Plate”).   But, we all make mistakes in business.  It’s how you handle them that makes the difference.

The head waiter could have come over to apologise – but no.  They could have offered me something in return, but no.   Instead, when I was presented with the bill, they said because of their mistake, they had not charged me for the starter I hadn’t received.  Well shucks – that’s good of them. 

Business Mistakes are an inconvenience.  They will always be an inconvenience to somebody – the question is – who?    If you make a mistake – you deliver late, you miss something off, you forget something, is it good enough to just say “sorry” and expect your customers to deal with the inconvenience?   If this is the case, would you expect repeat business, quick and easy payment, and recommendations?  Or would you expect complaints, bad reviews (that internet is a powerful place for people with axes to grind) and problems in the future?

I for one want a simple life – a stress free life.  Which is why whenever I do make mistakes (it happens), I make sure my customers are not inconvenienced.

What about you?

As the saying goes, Business is Business.   However, different businesses have different ways of doing business.

What is typical for one company may be completely different for another.  These differences can be exaggerated and highlighted when a freelancer or small business works with a larger company.   Whilst a large business may be stuck in procedures, committees and rules, being a smaller more dynamic company means that we can make decisions and change direction in an instant.

You may be proud of the way that you do business.  You may have ways of working which bring numerous advantages to your customers.  But if your customers have never dealt with freelancers or small companies before, the advantages will not be working to your advantage.  Your customers just may not know what to expect.

Which is why you may need a Working Practices paper.  This is a short guide which says how you prefer to work;  the steps you follow, that you would prefer your customers to follow, and which sells their advantages.   You don’t have to make it too heavy on the sales speak, but if your processes indicate the advantages, it becomes a valuable tool.

Not only does it add extra ‘bumf’ to your sales hand-out pack, not only does it give another reason for them to pick you over a competitor, but it also sets a baseline on how you want them to work.

Now I am not talking Terms and Conditions here.  Terms are all the legal rubbish you need to protect yourself.  Your practices are how you work with the client – do you meet, is it by email only, how quickly you respond, do you get sign off before you start work, etc.

As an example, here is a copy of my Working Practices (click to zoom, print or save):

Business Partnerships can be great.  If you can find another company that compliments you, the result can be business opportunities that are bigger than the sum of the individual parts.  But, there can be one major problem with some partnerships – spec (free) work.

I have worked in partnership with many other companies in the past.  In each instance without exception, we have agreed who is the lead in the partnership, and the leader pays the other for their services.   This works for me – we can still run the process as a partnership, but money is not an issue.  Everybody knows where they stand.

Recently, I was asked to work in a partnership, but where the work was done on spec.   they asked that I (and my company) work for free, investing our time and resources for a share of the future possible sales of the resulting project.

Now don’t get me wrong – this sort of relationship may well work for some people.  I can see in situations where work is thin and money is tight (such as when two start-ups meet) this can be very tempting.   It may be very beneficial to all concerned, and the results in the future could be massive.

But the word to consider here is could.   Could to me is a gamble, a chance, a risk.   With such a relationship, you are of course assuming that the company/product you partner with is good enough to make a lot of sales – but what happens if it doesn’t?  It could be a lot of wasted effort for no returns.

Call it boring, but I prefer to know that I am going to be paid, how much and by when.   Anything else is just a gamble.

And the only time I gamble is when I order take away food.

Having just (foolishly) paid for an extended warranty on  a washing machine that already has a 10 year guarantee (doh), warranties and guarantees have been on my mind recently.   In business, it’s hard to imagine any company that should not offer some form of warranty.   But if you don’t specify the specific terms, the customers can only guess what is reasonable.

If you buy a chocolate bar and open it to find it spoilt, you would expect you have a right to return it to the shop for a refund.  The same is true for a washing machine – if it suddenly stops or floods your kitchen, I am sure you will dig out the warranty card and the receipt to see if you are calling a repairman, or the store you purchased it from.

But what about our own small business products, and even services?  Do you, and should you, offer any warranty or guarantee on your own business?

Warranty on Service and products

Clearly on products, the customer can expect them to work.  But what about services?   If you work to provide a web site, software or consultancy and the customer finds mistakes (errors in the text or parts that are incorrect), do you expect the customer to correct them, would you charge for such corrections, or do you correct for free?  If you accept the responsibility, how long should you make corrections for?

Peace of Mind

Clearly, warranties are there for peace of mind.  They are insurance against you (as a supplier) making mistakes and delivering faulty products or services.  As such, any warranty or guarantee should be part of your sales pitch to have any value.  If only mentioned after delivery, they are just a cost with no value to you as a supplier.

Any form of warranty or guarantee should also give you peace of mind.  It should say what is reasonable, and what is unacceptable.  Without a warranty clause, how do you deal with customers who complain about a bug 6 years after using the software or web site?

My Own Warranty Clause

For my own company, the warranty is presented to the customer as part of the sales pitch – it’s part of the value add – the reason to buy from me.  It helps remove risk to both parties.  It therefore appears in my sales material, in the quotations I provide, and also in my terms and conditions.

I factor in some small post-delivery corrective action into my quote figures, and provide a warranty for corrections for the first 12 months after supply (for smaller projects, this may be reduced).  But, and here is the important bit, I limit the warranty in terms of the original design and customer process/data.  If they change or break something on their side of the fence, then the warranty becomes null and void.

Take for instance, a data reporting project.   My warranty (basic) terms would say:

The solution provided would be supported by {mycompany} for the first 12 months after delivery without further charge or restriction within our normal terms of service and within our normal working times of 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday excluding public holidays.   This is also restricted to:

• Support within scope of delivery (brief description here, database format, source database, etc)
• Where the source databases matches the original source database (i.e, no new fields are supported, source fields or data formats changed, etc)
• Based on original requirements

So what are you doing about your warranty?